Dec 6, 2009 | Management, Marketing
Social media is more than Facebook, Twitter and U-Tube, it is a suite of tools that enables rapid connections to be made, it creates and leverages knowledge, and enables very rapid development of an organisation of those who may be unconnected physically.
Imagine, the government decides to put a waste plant in the local park of your community. Predictably, there will be substantial local opposition in the local community who will want it elsewhere.
Under the “old” way of organizing a protest, someone would get on the phone, and try to stir up some passion and get people to a rally in Macquarie Street, (and a few will turn up so long as it does not rain), letters will be written to the local member, the Minister, the local council, and a few others, and the kids will run a partition around the neighborhood. Not very effective.
Under the “new” way, someone will register a domain “stopthewasteincroydon.org” and a site that will collect views, stories about how the kids use the park, signatures, disseminate information, clog up every conceivable receiver with emails, provide links to the U-tube footage of kids playing then being herded off the park by officious waste managers (actors, probably the kids dads) , and generally make a very big noise against the development. Very effective, the Anti position suddenly has real teeth, because it enabled the anti case to be developed then managed in a way that it has a geometric impact on the receivers, all because the new communication tools were used to assemble and leverage a set of views that would have otherwise been individual, and nowhere near as powerful.
Dec 3, 2009 | Leadership, Personal Rant
Here I am in a regional NSW town, now a bit late at night, engaged by a client to assist in the strategic development of their business, and after a very long day, lifting my head to discover the premier of the state has changed, again. This follows yesterday, when there was a meltdown at federal level with the other lot.
My client is a manufacturer, they employ people, train them, make stuff, and contribute to their community, whilst dealing with the crap imposed by a series of governments trying to be relevant to voters, whilst satisfying demands of their various looney back room brokers.
On another TV channel to the press conference o f the new NSW premier, (what is her name, what has she done to demonstrate she can run a multi billion dollar business like NSW) is an old concert by Stevie Nix. Loved her as contributor to Fleetwood Mac’s best days, but she has passed her best, even when warbling some of the old classics.
Point is, I would rather have a broken down old pop singer in the background than the new premier of the state where I live, and need to make my living working with businesses that produce stuff.
Will the state be better off tomorrow with the fourth premier in four years, will the trains run on time, the emergency wards save lives, will the teachers in the schools feel they have an important task ahead of them for which they will be recognised? I think not.
Aristotle may have been right, but what did we do to deserve this shallow bunch of sycophantic twits, bleeding us dry whilst assuring it is all for our own good.
A pox on both their houses.
Dec 3, 2009 | Branding, Marketing
Building a brand is about the consistency of action thought, and expression over a long period of time, and only the CEO can ensure that this happens.
The CEO must be the chief brand manager, as the brand is the business, it is not the packaging, or advertising, it is everything that a consumer sees, feels and consumes.
This also opens the question to boards, “Do you have the right CEO”?
Dec 2, 2009 | Leadership
The mess the liberal Party finds itself in is a sad reflection on their collective capacity to address the issues surrounding climate change in a sensible and reasoned manner, at least I think so.
It is pretty clear that humans collectively carry a heavy responsibility for the degradation of the planet, and that collectively we need to start to address it, equally it is true to acknowledge that Australians are the largest generators of CO2 per head when you take into account the emissions of our power stations, and of those around the world fired using our coal, but by ourselves we can do nothing, our size means we are simply irrelevant to the solution of the problems.
Changing the fundamental framework of our economy a few days before a major world conference on the issue appears to make no sense at all, and for the Liberals to dump as leader one of the few people in Parliament who actually knows how to run a business and make a dollar is the height of stupidity, but can we have both?
Like Turnbull, or hate him, it is undeniable that the drive and capacity he has used to build a personal fortune can only benefit the country when directed at our collective fortune. However, he would have signed up to the ETS before Copenhagen.
A conundrum, the leader we need if we are to raise the productivity of the economy, but doing something that defies logic, or one who is a one trick pony on the issue of the day, albeit in this case a crucial one, who has not got any commercial credentials.
Nov 30, 2009 | Innovation, Leadership, Marketing
The Victorian era threw up some extraordinary characters, amongst them Charles Dodgson, better known by his pseudonym, Lewis Carrol
Here was a man who is best known for a children’s story, one that has deep messages for adults together with the absorbing story for kids, but whose body of work includes hugely creative endeavors in mathematics and photography, as well as writing in all its forms.
Looking for something to use in a seminar on innovation a while ago, I stumbled across a wonderful quotation that encompasses the challenges many find when trying to build an innovation culture in their organisations, and it comes from one of Alice’s conversations with the cat.
“Can you tell me which way I ought to go from here” said Alice
“That depends a good deal on where you want to get to” said the cat
” I don’t much care where” said Alice
“Then it doesn’t matter which way you walk” said the cat.
Seems to me to be a great explanation for the necessity of having a plan, with a worthwhile goal as the objective of a journey, and all innovation is after all, just a journey.
